European genealogical research, in general, is connected
to ecclesiastical jurisdictions where the birth, christening, marriage, death,
and burial records are now found. As a result, researchers tracing their
forebears must search parish registers of the denomination to which their
ancestors belonged. In the nineteenth-century German states, for example, most
people were Catholic or Lutheran.

During the middle to late 1800s, the
historic boundaries of German parishes were usually designated solely in general
terms. Although the components of the old parishes are known, they are defined
only by towns assigned to each parish. To help genealogists locate the
appropriate church records, Kevan M. Hansen is working on a projected 47-volume
series, MAP GUIDE TO GERMAN PARISH REGISTERS. He recently completed
Volume 24: THURINGIA.

Working with digitized underlying
maps of Germany, Hansen draws the old boundaries to encompass the towns included
in each individual parish. The maps show how the various parishes fit together
and specifies the borders of each district, adjoining towns, and surrounding
parishes. Often, these are the first maps showing the boundaries of the
nineteenth-century German parishes. Using the data, genealogists can identify
the parish where their ancestors most likely worshipped, based on where their
forebears lived. A knowledge of the adjoining parishes also allows family
researchers to locate the church their forefathers attended if it was situated
in a neighboring parish.

Like the previous volumes in
Hansen's series, THURINGIA furnishes separate parish boundary maps for
Catholic and Lutheran churches, an inventory of congregations of minority
religions (in this case, German Reformed and Jewish), and a complete index to
towns. In addition, Volume 24 provides the Family History Library microfilm
number for individual parish records. By entering the number in the Microfilm
Number Search in the Family History Library Catalog at
www.familysearch.org, genealogists can
get a printout of all available films for a given parish and the years included
on each reel.

Although Hansen's publication is not
a manual for conducting German family research, it helps to speed up the
process. Anyone with forebears from this state will find useful information in
MAP GUIDE TO GERMAN PARISH REGISTERS: THURINGIA.

The 243-page paperback has a bright
and interesting cover. It also has a foreword, an introduction by Leland K.
Meitzler, a concise discussion of the area's historical background, a list of
the region's main rulers, a section about Thuringia's genealogical resources
(archives, repositories, periodicals, and genealogical collections, for
instance), and an explanation of how to use the volume. To the paperback price
of $34.95 ($65.00 for hardback), buyers should add handling charges of $4.90 for
one book and $2.50 for each additional copy. The reference work may be purchased
from Family Roots Publishing Company, P. O. Box 830, Bountiful, Utah 84011-0830
(phone 801-992-3705; fax 815-642-0103; website
www.FamilyRootsPublishing.com;
e-mail: Lmeitzler@gmail.com).

Charles N. Ferguson, 811 South
Market, Shawnee, OK 74801 is seeking the names of the parents and date and place
of death for John SMITH, born in 1835 in Missouri. On 17 April 1859 in Hopkins
Co., TX, he married Mary GRACE, who was born in 1837 in Tennessee. They had one
known child, Charley Austin SMITH, who was born in June 1861 in Texas. John
SMITH may have gone to serve in the Civil War from Hopkins County. Ferguson
cannot locate John and Mary on the 1870 Texas census and would appreciate help
in finding them.